Tesla Crash!

Just hours after taking delivery of his brand new electric supercar, the unnamed owner of Tesla #6 has found himself back at the
Menlo Park dealership awaiting news from his insurance company. Dane
Golden reports that his friend Alex Volkov stumbled upon the first crash of a privately owned Tesla. At 6PM on Friday afternoon, the Jet Black beauty found itself unceremoniously wedged in front of an early ‘90s Camry and beneath a
2000s C-Class at the corner of Geary Boulevard and Gough Street in San
Francisco.

Volkov, who came upon the carbon fiber carbon-friendly wreck ten minutes after it occurred, told Wired.com that the crash scene was sedate with only one police car blocking traffic. “No action, no drama — everyone was very mellow,” Volkov said. “Nobody was blaming anybody. The people involved in the crash were just giving their testimony for police officers.” Volkov and bloggers speculated that the car was being driven by a Tesla engineer since it had no license plates. However, Darryl Siry, Tesla’s Vice President of
Marketing, told Wired.com that #6 (shown here in happier times) had been delivered to a customer’s home shortly before the accident. “It was a Tesla customer who got into that accident. We’re aware of it because we service our vehicles,” he said, though he declined to name the customer (who he did identify as male) so as to protect his identity.

Autopia is working on obtaining an official copy of the police report from the San Francisco Police Department. Until then, we’ll bring you some good old-fashioned he-said, she-said and post-crash photos.

According to Volkov, eyewitnesses to the crash told him the Roadster had gone “unnoticed” because of its low profile and silent powertrain. “There was extensive recording, switching between police officers to compare notes – writing, writing, writing, more than I’ve seen in an average accident, especially because they couldn’t believe the statements. They were trying to establish the fact of the car’s unnoticeability.”

Though he arrived well after the crash, Volkov speculated the accident was the fault of the Tesla’s driver because eyewitnesses told him the
Tesla’s driver was trying to “go bumper to bumper between the cars,” a theory supported by the damage to the Tesla’s right front and rear corners. The car “probably would still be ok if the first one didn’t suddenly stop in rush hour traffic,”
which Volkov estimated was moving between 25 and 30 miles per hour. Volkov did not speak with any of the drivers involved.

Siry said that the customer was rear-ended, a theory that makes sense considering the angle of the crash and that the airbags didn’t deploy. “He didn’t crash into someone,” he said. “The rear-ending caused him to go under the car in front of him — my guess is that’s why the airbags didn’t deploy.”

Right now the car is at the dealership with a positive prognosis. “We have the car now. I think it’s repairable,” Siry said. “I
haven’t seen it personally, let’s wait until the insurance company takes a look at it.” He doubted it would be totaled because so much of the car’s value lies in its batteries. “It’s a very unique car, it’s sad that it happened,” he said.

This is the fourth Tesla to be damaged. The first two were crash tests sacrificed in the name of federal crashworthiness certification, while former Tesla CEO Mark Eberhard’s car was damaged by a technician during delivery. According to Siry, between 8 and 10 of the
$109,000 electric cars have been delivered. Let’s hope none of them meet the same fate as this one.